Working with MisRed was a marvel: Jah Prayzah

Jah Prayzah’s Kune Rima music video has gone viral and has more than 200 000 views trended this week alone.
This is because of its unique vintage theme that took people back to the 60s.

Radio personality MisRed took up the task of being Jah Prayzah’s love interest.
Behind the scenes were people like Vusa Blaqs who directed and edited the music video, Thembani Mubochwa who did the wardrobe and styled the whole vintage feel with Tsungi Makwanya on makeup.

Thembani has been working with Jah Prayzah for the past three years, styling most of his red carpet and stage outfits.

The music video reminded Jah Prayzah fans of his 2013 Mwanasikana music video that also had a vintage look.

Jah Prayzah said: “Kune Rima video was produced to recreate what happened in the 1960s. We looked at pictures from that time and we came up with this theme.

“I can’t really say that I thought about it (concept) for a long time. It just came as an idea that ‘won’t it be interesting for us to come up with such a theme’.”

He said although the music video has some resemblance with Mwanasikana, this one has an uptown feel to it.

“Mwanasikana was set at a growth point in Zimbabwe. Although the dressing looks similar, with Kune Rima, we wanted to give it an uptown setting. I wanted the music video to resonate with my style with better camera work and production than Mwanasikana,” said Jah Prayzah.

During the run up to the music video’s release, there were pictures that “leaked” of him and MisRed in a love clutch. This did not go down well with the social media brigade who quickly made known their displeasure, speculating that the two were involved in an illicit affair. Some aired their concern for Jah Prayzah’s wife, but the musician said he was unperturbed by that entire melee.

“I was calm and relaxed. I knew that the allegations about the pictures weren’t true. It was just work. I even told my wife that there were pictures that would be “leaked”. She was ready and people actually sent her the pictures,” said Jah Prayzah.

He said working with MisRed was a marvel as she was comfortable with her role and knew what she was doing. Thembani, Jah Prayzah said was also a joy to work with.
On his part, stylist and designer Thembani said Jah Prayzah is a man who knew what he wanted in terms of style for the Kune Rima video, making his job easy.

“Working with Jah Prayzah is the easiest thing one can do. He knows what type of style he wants and with this music video, it wasn’t different. I was in charge of everything on set in terms of tailoring but he came up with the idea of what he wanted and I tailored his outfits,” said Thembani.

“We designed everything from scratch for both Jah Prayzah and MisRed’s outfits. We used local materials and the outfits were from my collection.”

The music video’s visuals were beautiful and drew a lot of attention and that can only be the works of a talented director and producer in the form of Vusa Blaqs. Vusa Blaqs, refusing to reveal the budget for the music video, said he was surprised by MisRed’s awareness and execution of her role in front of the camera.

“MisRed surprised me. She did a very great job in front of the camera. Every scene with her was done in one take. She followed my instructions to the letter and added some of her own ideas during the music video shoot,” said Blaqs.

He said what also helped was the onscreen chemistry between MisRed and Jah Prayzah, something he worked on way before the shoot.

“I had asked both of them to spend time together and be in each other’s space. And they did that; MisRed would come to the studios and spend time with Jah. They got used to each other’s company and it became easy for them to bring out that chemistry on camera come the day of the shoot,” said Blaqs.

He said the music video took eight hours to shoot and he had to ask DJ Tamuka to extend the song so that it could fit the many different scenes.

For her role, MisRed told our sister publication H-Metro that Blaqs who directed the video was a genius.

To get MisRed on a music video, she said she has to be in sync with your vision as an artiste before anything else.

“I’m not really a music video type of girl; I’m interested in creating brilliant content with people who get my craziness. Don’t think I’ll really do another music video after this, but I’ve a standard rider, I work with specific glam team, so if that’s not there it may not happen,” she said.

MisRed was labelled a home-wrecker after a picture of her cuddling with Jah Prayzah (from the video shoot) was leaked to the public. Asked whether the leaked pictures and music video had caused a rift between her and Rufaro — Jah Prayzah’s wife, MisRed said: “Mai Mukombe is a star player, she was part of the process and again, Jah Prayzah is extremely professional.

“People will always have opinions but at the end of the day, we wanted to create great content for the fans who truly appreciate Jah Prayzah’s music and love MisRed the personality.”

She said this incident was helpful as she discovered that some people she deemed friends were actually the ones who were at the forefront deriding her.

“I saw people’s true characters as I had ‘friends’ say the nastiest things about me in groups. I had to keep a straight face as there were women who were ready to judge me just to be at the top of the story, but I’m grateful for that.

“I’m an extremely vocal person online and I don’t shy away from responding to negativity because I’m also human, but on this one I had to take a back seat. It was hard, my management actually wanted to change my social media passwords because they know me well but I think I was calm enough.”

MisRed said although the experience was emotionally draining, it was worth it in the end. The Chronicle.